


Delirious

by Threshie



Category: Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes, Marvel
Genre: Blood, Delirium, First Aid, Forehead Kisses, Huddling For Warmth, Injury, Inner Dialogue, M/M, Shirtless
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-08
Updated: 2016-10-08
Packaged: 2018-08-20 07:04:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,160
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8240452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Threshie/pseuds/Threshie
Summary: Clint is shot during an Avengers battle, and both Bruce Banner and the Hulk help get him to safety. It's not the first time the archer has been shot, and he's staying pretty calm about it if he does say so, himself.





	

The distant boom of bombs didn’t seem so ominous now, Clint thought as he stared up at the ceiling. Rock ceiling? Cave, he realized distantly. Damn was he tired. There was a ringing in his ears from that last grenade, and he was sure the way Hulk was carrying him was not helping. Blood loss sure wasn’t helping, either.

It wasn’t like this was the first time Clint had been shot. This wasn’t a fatal hit, just a leg, but the fact that it didn’t really hurt should have worried him more than it did. Instead, he just felt tired. Shock, maybe, he thought mildly. If Natasha could see him, she’d have been proud of how calm he was. Last time he got shot, he’d been a lot less mild-mannered about it.

His thoughts were interrupted by Hulk, who placed him on the floor of the cave with surprising care. The big green guy had gone from snarling and hurling tanks out there to carrying him to safety. Knowing how much Hulk liked to smash things, Clint was pretty touched he’d been the higher priority. He stopped staring at the ceiling, shifting his gaze to the giant’s green eyes.

“Wh-what? S'just a bullet,” Clint mumbled, seeing the concern practically written on his face. Hulk looked so worried. It wasn’t like he was dying, it was just a bullet wound. He clumsily stuck a hand up to pat the big guy’s cheek, leaving a smear of blood. Whoops. “I-I’ll live, buddy. Thanks for…g-getting me out of there.”

Okay, so he didn’t sound okay. His voice was pretty shaky. Man, that was a lot of blood on his hand. Didn’t the bullet hit a leg? While he was trying to figure out how that worked, Hulk was sitting back, the green in his skin fading rapidly to gray. In moments, he had shrunken and turned pale and freckled. Bruce sat up, the smear of blood still on his cheek, and shook Clint’s shoulder quickly.

“Clint! Hey, can you hear me?”

The blond smirked up at him.

“A-and I thought Hulk sounded worried.”

“He IS worried,” Bruce said, frowning. He was already at work, ripping some cloth up near Clint’s legs. Probably the leg of his pants, then. Right. Bleeding wound, needed bandaging, all that jazz…

“Not l-like I haven’t been shot before,” Clint pointed out almost lazily, looking back up at the ceiling. He felt light-headed, kind of floaty. Why didn’t this hurt more?

“Well, you’re in shock,” Bruce informed him, wrapping and binding the wound on his leg with surprising speed. And he said he wasn’t that kind of doctor. Uh-huh.

“Am not.” Clint rolled his eyes. That made him dizzy. Whoa. “Uh…so, what’re we gonna do now?” Hulk didn’t smash everything in sight, so there were still guys outside with bombs and grenades, probably.

“Nothing,” Bruce replied flatly. He was wiping blood off of his hands onto Clint’s other pant leg. The blond started to get annoyed, then realized he’d probably already bled all over the pants anyway. Oh, and they were missing a leg now, too. Oh, well.

“Huh? Hulk could fight ‘em,” he told Bruce. Now why did he feel sleepy all of a sudden? Sleepy and cold. Really cold—damn, cave floors weren’t exactly the best place to lay down.

Bruce must have heard him thinking about the cold—wait, what? Bruce couldn’t read minds. Clint left that thought half-finished, looking on in confusion when the brunette lay down beside him and curled up against his side.

“Hey….uh, love you too,” he mumbled, hugging an arm over the thin man uncertainly. Shit, did he say that out loud? Before he could recall, for some reason the pain from the bullet wound decided to kick in all of a sudden. Bruce had to have felt him tense, and he winced loudly. “Owwww, shit! Th-there it is…”

“Just try not to move much,” Bruce sighed from near his shoulder. Clint wanted to see the guy’s face, check if he’d heard that little “love you” slip up, but lifting his head seemed like an impossible task right now. He felt heavy and tired and cold.

Bruce was warm against his side. Since he was pretty sure there wasn’t anything he could do to make his leg hurt more than it already did, Clint turned onto his side and hugged the other arm around the brunette as well. He could see only the top of the shorter man’s head at first, until Bruce peeked up at him. He looked a little sad.

“We’ll leave as soon as it’s quiet out there,” he murmured, like Clint needed reassuring that this would be over soon. Like it was so unpleasant, laying there holding him. How the hell was he so warm without even wearing a shirt? After what felt like a very long, slow reaction time, Clint mustered a smile and patted the brunette’s back clumsily.

“Okay. Hey, thanks…thanks for, uh…” He paused, trying to find the right word in his fuzzy thoughts. “For saving me.” No, that wasn’t quite it, damn it. He felt himself frowning thoughtfully, and Bruce’s brown eyes seemed troubled as he watched.

“You’re welcome, Clint,” he replied quietly, closing his eyes again.

Clint shook his head, though, as best he could while laying down.

“N-no, that’s not…I mean, I’m glad you did that, too, but that’s not…it,” he said, trying desperately to make sense. What the hell was he even trying to say? It was more of a feeling than a word. He looked at Bruce for a long moment, his eyes closed and freckles standing out starkly on his pale face. He looked damned tired, as usual. Turning into Hulk and back took a lot out of him, apparently.

He still didn’t have a word for this. Bruce, he was just grateful for Bruce. And Hulk. Both of them.

Impulsively, he kissed Bruce’s forehead. The brunette’s eyes flew open, and he stared up at Clint, just stared at him. Clint stared back, a bit sheepish about what he’d done, but unapologetic. After a moment of this, Bruce settled his head down to rest on Clint’s shoulder again, and neither said anything more.

Later, back at the Avengers mansion, Clint awoke in his bed, with bandages on his leg and strict orders to rest in bed. The bullet caught an artery, they said, and he’d lost a lot of blood. He’d been delirious, and had been talking to thin air. Hulk had carried him home.

Nobody said anything about caves or Bruce or bandages made with his pant leg. Clint was convinced he’d imagined the whole thing until the brunette’s eyes happened to catch his as he passed by the couch where Clint was camped out, watching TV.

And he blushed. Bruce Banner blushed. Clint may have been talking to thin air, but it wasn’t thin air he’d kissed in that cave.

**Author's Note:**

> Ah, a fanfic upholding the longtime tradition of creating a problem just to see how the characters react to it. Bruce is so in control of himself that making him blush is a pretty big accomplishment. Poor guy probably hasn't been hugged or kissed in years.


End file.
